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Every community has rules. Below are the guidelines for ours, as well as crucial information associated with joining/playing in our roleplay. Be sure to read all of the information provided, and if you have any questions, contact the staff.

Board Rating

Both the forum and roleplays are generally T-Rated/PG-13 with minor and discouraged M-rated content depending on the content and circumstances. Though the below generally applies to the roleplay itself, it's also a good set of guidelines to abide by in the general forums as well.

Simulated gambling: Player can gamble without betting or wagering real cash or currency.

Alcohol Reference: Reference to and/or images of alcoholic beverages.

Tobacco Reference: Reference to and/or images of tobacco products

IF YOU'RE UNSURE ABOUT CERTAIN CONTENT, CONSULT THE ADMIN OR MODERATORS FIRST.

Posting Rules - General

Don't act rude or stuck up, especially if you're new here. Respect our rules and treat others the way you want to be treated yourself. Remember, being a member of our community is a privilege, not a right, and poor house guests will be kicked out.

Should you have a problem with another member, please resolve it privately. It's what the private messaging system as well as instant messaging were designed for. Likewise, hate speeches and personal attacks on other members are not allowed. Period.

Use proper grammar and spelling PLEASE! This is a community of writers, and you will not be respected, much less accepted into the community, if you're unwilling to put out a little effort toward writing intelligently. You don't have to have flawless english, but come on, the spell-checker does exist for a reason!

Keep cursing down to a minimum. Yes, all of us curse around here, but please avoid doing it excessively. Excessive swearing reflects poorly on your vocabulary and intelligence and will cause members to not respect you.

Please avoid sexual talk stronger than innuendo. Most of us here are 18+, but we do also allow younger members here. And besides that, it goes against our board's rating. This isn't a place to cyber.

Avoid making single word posts that consist of just things like "okays" or "lols", etc. Contrary to popular belief, having the highest post count doesn't make you cool.

Unless you actually play them yourself, please do not use character names as part of your screen name ("Sonic", "Rouge2Hot4U", etc.), as this can cause confusion over who they belong to, as well as tend to make the actual players uncomfortable.

Avoid stretching the tables please. This means please don't write absurdly long strings of text without breaks that warps the board's shape. Likewise this also extends to images, though we do have a board script that automatically changes them into links if they become excessive. Likewise, please avoid excessively large signatures and avatars. The staff WILL remove them if found or reported.

While the board can be used as a means for communication for character development and plot discussion, most members choose to communicate through Discord. We strongly encourage you to consider joining it as we hold daily group chats and use it as a vital means of socialization, plot discussion, and world building.

The staff will always have the final say as well as the right to lock, move, edit and delete topics/posts if he or she believes they are in violation of our rules.

Posting Rules - In Game

No Godmoding: This means no taking control of other people’s characters unless that person has given you permission. This can be anything from making them jump off a cliff to saying how they react to something. Your character is for you to control, other people’s characters are other people’s.

No Metagaming: Metagaming is when you, the player, exploit knowledge the characters don't or shouldn't know. One example of this would be if a player has their character suddenly turn the room's temperature up, knowing that the other players had just discussed a villain who uses ice-based weapons will appear any moment. What constitutes metagaming boils down to case-by-case basis and depends on how convenient a situation is. Use common sense when writing.

Past-Tense Only: In the past we've had some people use present-tense writing when the majority of players use past. This disrupts the flow when reading and is generally considered improper. For this reason, it is no longer allowed. (And no, you can't write in future-tense either.)

Nothing Inappropriate: Follow the board rating guidelines. This means no excessive blood or gore - any severe enough wounds that may occur must be handled with minimal detail - no graphic depictions. Sexual content cannot be stronger than innuendo, and if it becomes absolutely necessary… fade to black and go get a room, okay? Drug, alcohol, and cigarette usage are to be used in moderation - drinking a glass of wine is fine, but getting drunk off the stool is not something we generally encourage.

Respect other players: Don't pitch a fit because so-and-so made something happen you don't like or agree with. If you're unable to work with/around it, politely ask the person if they would alter or delete what they've written. The best way to avoid this is to communicate with the other players and discuss threads/plots with each other. Again, it is highly recommended that you consider getting Discord if you don't already have it.

Don't abuse creative freedom: Creative freedom is a wonderful thing, but can easily turn ugly if abused. Don't take your liberties to assume what another character, group or organization has or hasn't done without first consulting the players responsible for them. This has been a serious issue in the past, and it's considered a form of godmoding. Likewise, it's a smart choice to discuss anything involving objects or devices in general with other players to make sure they're kosher. We don't want your button that will detonate the bomb in the center of the planet.

Try to be active: While we're not heavily fast-paced, no one enjoys waiting for weeks or months for a single thread to move. We ask that you get involved only if you're capable of checking into the board at least once or twice a day. If your schedule can't permit this, we ask out of courtesy that you consider holding your activity; write out any active characters (or find substitute players) and keep inactive characters inactive until your schedule can permit otherwise. Members who show little to no activity for long periods of time run the risk of having any canon or semi-canon characters they own taken and placed up for adoption.

Use character icons: So a specific character's post can be easily identified, we use character icons. These icons should uniformly be around 54x54 pixels. If you don't have an icon or a place to host it, both can be provided to you (if you don't have character art, one of the many artists in the community may be willing to draw one for you if you ask politely). Shortcuts to these icons can be requested on the forum, and even if you don't currently possess an icon, it may be wise to still use the desired keyword you'll want so all old posts will automatically be affected when you do acquire one.

Link your wiki profiles in your signatures: When you have characters accepted into the roleplay, your wiki profile should serve as a place to list all of them together with links to their profiles as well as a list of threads they belong to. These are useful and important references that are often used by many players.

Follow the character guidelines: Your character must fit our guidelines to be accepted. Don't apply a character that fits the guidelines and then later change it to something that otherwise isn't or may not be allowed - speak with the staff and other players before making any major changes. Also, whenever you make changes to a profile, you should be sure to notify the staff and please please please apply this to their wiki profile. You'll find the character guidelines here

SegaStH

SegaStH's plot is based off the Japanese version of the video game continuity. Other continuities, such as Sonic X, are not accepted as part of our continuity. However, as we're a liberal group, some members may have adapted elements from other continuities that compliment Sega's.

It is also important to note that time flow in the roleplay itself is rough and hard (if nearly impossible) to estimate accurately. Rather than a universal measure, time passes differently for each individual character. Only major events may be given a rough time estimate if it becomes necessary. As there are a lot of Sonic games, to the side is the list of the games this roleplay acknowledges along with a rough estimate of when they happened. The games are listed in our accepted chronological order, not by the dates they were released. BEING RE-WORKED TO REFLECT GAMES RELEASED SINCE THIS GUIDELINE WAS MADE

TIMELINE BEING RE-WORKED.

SatAMStH

SatAMStH is based off the ABC Saturday morning Sonic cartoon commonly known as "SatAM". However, this group takes place in between seasons 1 and 2, in the alternate timeline created by Blast to the Past, therefore everything from the second season and the canned third season is not acknowledged. Therefor it has not occurred and items such as the Deep Power Stones will never come into play. Other continuities, such as Archie, are not accepted as part of our continuity. However, as we're a liberal group, some members may have adapted elements from other continuities that compliment SatAM's.

It is also important to note that time flow in the roleplay itself is rough and hard (if nearly impossible) to estimate accurately. Rather than a universal measure, time passes differently for each individual group and to a lesser degree character. Only major events may be given a rough time estimate if it becomes necessary.

Posting Rate

This only applies to roleplay threads within the playing grounds and off-canon area. It does not apply to the general and OOC discussion boards.

In order to prevent people from being swept away/forgotten and to prevent an overwhelming number of people from joining a single thread, the posting rate has been implemented to control how often a player is allowed to post. For each [b]roleplay[/b] post you make, depending on the number of people in the thread, you must wait until a certain amount of posts are made by others.

Generally, players will wait until everyone in a thread has either taken their turn or has passed, but as long as the majority have gone it can be okay for you to post again. Below is a series of clauses where you may be permitted to break the posting rate cycle.

Inactivity Clause: If a day passes without a member in the cycle having posted, you're allowed to post once again regardless. Afterward, however, you must wait again. This typically should only apply to one person. If after five days a player does not post in the thread, you may subtract one player from the thread's player count. Despite this, out of courtesy, most players often choose to ignore this clause except for in extreme circumstances.

Battle Clause: In the event that a battle breaks out in the thread (Sonic vs Shadow, for example) the posting rate rule is no longer in effect until the battle ends. Even though the rate rule is no longer in effect when a battle breaks out, it's courteous to allow other people to catch their breath or join in the fight.

Conversation Clause: If two or three characters are having a conversation (or, in some cases, a non-verbal situation) and in the natural flow of speech it seems appropriate for a specific character to respond next out of turn, you may do this. However, this should only be done once, maybe twice before waiting again. As this is a clause that can easily be exploited, it's urged more then any other to practice courtesy and allow other players the chance to keep up. Exploitation will result in a warning.

Collaboration Clause: In some circumstances, you may have a post in mind that relies on a small response, action, or piece of dialogue from another character. In these cases, you are allowed to write a collaboration post in which you obtain a short one-liner-esque post from another player and integrate it into your own post to keep from disturbing the post rate. However, this should only be used in situations in which you need a short response to continue the post you had in mind. If the other player's response would be more than a couple lines of dialogue, break up your post and wait.

Dice and Combat

Unlike our previous rules, it is actually recommended that we attempt to utilize an RP combat system that does not require the use of dice. That is to say, we feel the need to encourage that actions once dictated by dicerolls to now be determined by how the player perceives the capable ability of their characters.

There are a couple of cons to this. Primarily, not everybody is going to find the results of an offensive post, or defensive post, to be fair, and could potentially contest the Player's decisions. Also, it's a little easier to simply roll for a number and go about things that way. However, compared to these points, I feel there are a lot more advantages to leaving out Dice altogether.

Key points being this:

- Lack of dice means having to work together with your playmate. This encourages communication and creative thinking.
- Lack of dice means lack of unfair character portrayals.
- Lack of dice means lack of possible cheating the system. (Such as re-rolls, addressed later)
- Lack of dice means that not only will actions solely be determined by the writer, but the concept of competitive roleplay will be further enhanced — potential for exciting events and gripping story progression heightened.

We understand that some may not agree with these statements, so instead of removing dice altogether, it is -still- an option for those who wish to use it. As such, information on the dice and how they function can be found further below.

In the semi-likely event that two players RPing combat have differing opinions on Dice Usage, it is recommended, then, that the one who prefers dice simply roll a reactionary 2-sided die to oncoming attacks or other offensive actions. Delegate the 1 to be a dodge, for example, or the 2 to be a failure. As it is, any attacks the dice-rolling Player do will not require the roll, as it will be up to the opposing player as to how well their Character handles the defense.

Due to the nature of this proposed roleplay system, any mods or admins of the group will partake in overseeing the fight, to ensure that things remain civil, and fair. Take some hits, dodge some hits, but do not dodge every attack, and land every blow, and become an invincible beast of the depths — The only one that comes close to that is Sonic, and even he isn't a perfect fighter, and will take hits and the like — because it's things like this that will make story progression exciting.

That's what we're here for! To make thrilling, exciting roleplay for entertainment and fun. So let's do just that!

Dice Usage

To use the dice, click the reply button (rather than use the quick reply). In the tag tray you'll see the option to add dice to your posts. After placing the desired number of tags, click preview (some users of Firefox will need to preview twice) to see what they will roll. These numbers are static and will not change with any number of previews, after posting, or with any edits you make.

Dice are used for a number of things, from gambling, to helping players make decisions for their characters. Most prominently, however, they are used for (non-predetermined) battle purposes. During battle if your die roll is higher than your opponent's, your character gains the upper hand, whether by attacking or blocking/dodging. If it's lower, your character fails at their attempt. If a tie occurs, neither character get the upper hand.

When dice are in use by two players during a combat scenario, both will use the default six-sided dice. Should one player prefer not to use dice, the player who does will roll a two-sided die against their own luck to determine whether they dodge their opponent's attacks. It is acceptable to switch between using no dice and rolling against your luck as determined if you're unsure of what your character's success should be.